As a concrete example, I worry that living in the SF bay area is making me care less about extreme wealth disparities. I witness them so regularly that it’s hard for me to feel the same flare of frustration that I once did. This change has felt like a gradual hedonic adaptation, rather than a thoughtful shifting of my beliefs; the phrase “value drift” fits that experience well.
This seems to me adequately and better captured as saying the conditions of the world are different in ways that make you respond differently that you wouldn’t have endorsed prior to those conditions changing. That doesn’t mean your values changed, but the conditions to which you are responded changed such that your values are differently expressed; I suspect your values themselves didn’t change because you say you are worried about this change in behavior you’ve observed in yourself, and if your values had really changed you wouldn’t be worried.
My values being differently expressed seems very important, though. If I feel as if I value the welfare of distant people, but I stop taking actions in line with that (e.g. making donations to global poverty charities), do I still value it to the same extent?
That said, my example wasn’t about external behaviour changes, so you probably weren’t responding with that in mind.
I’ve inarguably experienced drift in the legibility of my values to myself, since I no longer have the same emotional signal for them. I find the the term “Value Drift” a useful shorthand for that, but it sounds like you find it makes things unclear?
My values being differently expressed seems very important, though. If I feel as if I value the welfare of distant people, but I stop taking actions in line with that (e.g. making donations to global poverty charities), do I still value it to the same extent?
Right, it sounds to me like you identify with your values in some way, like you wouldn’t consider yourself to still be yourself if they were different. That confuses things because now there’s this extra thing going on that feels causally relevant but isn’t, but I’m not sure I can hope to convince you in a short comment that you are not your values, even if your values are (temporarily) you.
This seems to me adequately and better captured as saying the conditions of the world are different in ways that make you respond differently that you wouldn’t have endorsed prior to those conditions changing. That doesn’t mean your values changed, but the conditions to which you are responded changed such that your values are differently expressed; I suspect your values themselves didn’t change because you say you are worried about this change in behavior you’ve observed in yourself, and if your values had really changed you wouldn’t be worried.
My values being differently expressed seems very important, though. If I feel as if I value the welfare of distant people, but I stop taking actions in line with that (e.g. making donations to global poverty charities), do I still value it to the same extent?
That said, my example wasn’t about external behaviour changes, so you probably weren’t responding with that in mind.
I’ve inarguably experienced drift in the legibility of my values to myself, since I no longer have the same emotional signal for them. I find the the term “Value Drift” a useful shorthand for that, but it sounds like you find it makes things unclear?
Right, it sounds to me like you identify with your values in some way, like you wouldn’t consider yourself to still be yourself if they were different. That confuses things because now there’s this extra thing going on that feels causally relevant but isn’t, but I’m not sure I can hope to convince you in a short comment that you are not your values, even if your values are (temporarily) you.